The present invention relates to methods and apparatus for determining the location of the user of a computer, and in particular to adjusting the sound controlled by the computer to enhance the stereo effect at the location of the user.
With the advent of multimedia computers, the sound controlled by the software, especially gaming software, has become an increasingly important part of the multimedia environment. Multimedia software makes significant use of right and left stereo separation to augment the images being displayed by the software.
It is thus important to provide sound with high quality. However, it is difficult to produce high quality sound for the computer system user as the user moves about. This is especially true for a user playing a game on a computer system, in which case the location of the user is not as fixed as in those situations where the user is typing with a word processing program, for example. The user of a computer game may assume a variety of locations relative to the computer while the game is being played.
Some computer systems, for example, the system described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,588,063 issued to Edgar, attempt to modify the sound in the vicinity of a user, but only for limited movements of the user. Furthermore, the system uses two complex and expensive arrays of speakers. The speakers are used as phased arrays to enhance the sound at the location of the user's ears, but to the detriment of the sound heard by others nearby.
What is needed is computer system that overcomes the disadvantages of other designs. The present invention does this in a novel and unobvious way.